Category: Myth Monday

A common objective about clicker training horses is that ‘you have to carry a clicker and treats around all the time‘. Is that what’s really holding you back or is it something else? Something fear based? Maybe you’re afraid your horse turns into a monster or becomes treat crazy and you don’t know how you would handleRead more about Is This The Reason that You don’t Clicker Train Your Horse?[…]

There are so many myths in the horse world it is hard to choose where to start debunking them. Since I have seen several advertisements on Facebook with videos of horses at liberty and instructors talking about ‘freedom’, ‘connection’, ‘positive training’ or ‘friendship’ while carrying a whip directing a horse with a swishing tail andRead more about Debunking Myths: ‘The Whip is only an Extension of my Arm’[…]

Only recently I heard about this persistent myth. It is a myth that is frequently shared amongst dog trainers and in the marine mammal world. The idea behind this myth is that predators are used to ‘working hard’ in order to get food while prey animals (herbivores), like horses, don’t have to work for their food. ‘The most valuable thingRead more about Myth Monday: Clicker Training doesn’t work for Prey Animals[…]

There is a huge misunderstanding about the word ‘pressure‘ in the horse world. I hear people who want to start positive reinforcement training but they hesitate: ‘How can I start clicker training my horse and don’t use any pressure? Isn’t that impossible?’ Yes, training a horse without pressure is impossible, but let me explain theRead more about Myth Monday: ‘Clicker Trainers don’t use Pressure’[…]

Equestrians are told all the time: ‘Be the leader to your horse’. But how does one become a leader? By dominating your horse? Who is the leader in the herd? Is it the stallion or is it the alpha mare? Or is there another leader? Odile Petit, PhD, of the University of Strasbourg, in Alsace, France says: ‘To really be a true leader, youRead more about Myth Monday: the leader of the herd[…]

All positive reinforcement trainers have heard people say: ‘Training horses with food rewards makes them pushy’. Some people even state ‘dangerous‘ instead of pushy. Maybe you have said it yourself before you started using positive reinforcement (+R) to train your horse. You get what you reinforce In +R training you use a reward that reinforces the behaviourRead more about Myth Monday: Training with Food rewards causes pushy Horses[…]

Often when I watch people ride I see struggle. I see a lot of frustration and it seems so difficult to learn how to ride. Truth is, that is is in the way riding is taught (in general), but it doesn’t have to be like this. Riding and learning to ride can be relatively easy andRead more about The 5 Essentials of Good Riding lessons (3/5)[…]